Veteran pilot says South Korea airport NEVER told them deadly concrete wall existed – aviators thought it was DIRT pile
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A VETERAN pilot said the South Korea airport where 179 people died in a plane crash never told them about the concrete wall. The Boeing 737-800 was thought to have been struck by a bird in one of its engines before it failed to lower landing gear and skidded across the runway, smashing into the wall and imploding.
![[The Jeju Air plane exploded after hitting the concrete wall]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/f6888273-5cbc-481c-9858-04393a8e9920.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
The wall, which was housed in a mound of dirt, sat some 250m past the end of the runway at Muan International Airport and held up a navigation sensor. Horrific footage caught the plane smashing into the wall and exploding. Passengers were killed and their bodies were thrown around the airport and a nearby field while the plane was incinerated.
![[The concrete wall was housed in a mound of dirt and held up a navigation device]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/181-people-thailand-south-korea-960689736_34468a.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
The unnamed pilot, with seven years experience flying into the airport, told Yonhap it never occurred to him it was made of concrete. He said: "I’ve seen the mound from the air during countless take-offs and landings and assumed it was a dirt pile. "There was no indication in the airport charts or separate guidance mentioning that the mound was a 2-metre-high, 4-metre-thick concrete structure.
"Other pilots were also unaware of its true nature.”. The air disaster left 179 people dead with only two surviving the terrifying crash as investigators continue to desperately search for answers. Comments in the airport's operating manual - uploaded early this year - said the embankment was too close to the end of the runway.
![[The explosion flung bodies and parts of the plane around the airfield]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/south-koreas-muan-international-airport-960375384.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
